The consortium Unión Temporal Fibra Óptica Colombia, comprising Mexico’s TV Azteca and Total Play, has won Colombia’s National Fiber Optic Project auction with a deal worth about U.S. $640 million in public and private investments, including $220 million for the state and $420 million for the awarded company. Under the terms of the deal, the consortium will build and maintain a fiber-optic network across the country.
The Colombian government aims to deploy fiber-optic cable networks in 1,078 municipalities by 2014, which means connecting 753 additional municipalities by implementing 15,000 kilometers (about 9,300 miles) of fiber-optic cable.
Four companies and groups presented auction proposals to the Colombian government; the other three were Telmex Colombia SA, Unión Temporal Conectividad para todos (Media Commerce Partners, ZTE Corporación Sucursal Colombia, Exicom INC, Anditel SA); Unión Temporal Telefónica (Colombia Telecomunicaciones S.A and Telefónica Móviles).
Colombia’s minister of information and communications technology, Diego Vega, said the award was given to the joint venture that met all the technical, legal and financial specified in the tender specifications. Vega noted that “the award of the National Fiber Optic make Colombia a pioneer and leader to connect almost 100% of the municipalities in the country and allow the Colombian population to have a true information highway.”
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